


Yellow Petals

by ThebanSacredBand



Category: The Witcher (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Aromantic Character, Aromantic Yennefer, Brief suicidal thoughts, Chronic Illness, Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia is Bad at Feelings, Hanahaki Disease, Jaskier | Dandelion Whump, Jaskier's dad is a bit of an asshole, Mortality, Multi, Oblivious Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia, Vague Body horror?, angst with happy ending, in a typical hanahaki way, this made my housemate shout at me
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-08
Updated: 2020-08-20
Packaged: 2021-02-28 19:21:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 12
Words: 10,846
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23072368
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThebanSacredBand/pseuds/ThebanSacredBand
Summary: Jaskier falls in and out of love far too easily, and he has been coughing up yellow petals since he was five years old.
Relationships: Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia/Jaskier | Dandelion, Jaskier/Filavandrel, Jaskier/everyone
Comments: 247
Kudos: 806
Collections: Jaskier or Geralt/others (with or w/out eachother)





	1. Prologue: Julian

Julian Alfred Pankratz had been coughing up yellow petals since not long after he turned five years old. His nanny had shrieked up a dreadful fuss, and the Lady Pankratz had immediately called for a doctor, and the Earl de Lettenhove had shaken his head and walked to a different part of the house.

Little Julian had only be amused by the whole affair, the pretty yellow brightening up what was otherwise a rather dull day.

The doctor had said that he had never heard of this disease afflicting one so young. He ran what tests he could, to see if there could be some other cause, but what other cause could there be for petals in the lungs?

They stopped after a few days, and Julian forgot about them, in the way children are often wont to do.

But they came back again, and they stopped again, and the doctor and all the other doctors who followed him were at a loss, and his mother fluttered about in a panic, and his father cursed the child and wished for a normal son.

When Julian was nine, it was his music tutor who noticed that the petals came whenever he met someone new, and that they receded again after only a few days.

“The boy is a poet,” he told the Lady, “his heart is full of love, and he spends it as flowers.”

The Lady banned anyone her son did not know from entering the house, and the Earl started making plans to have a new son who wasn’t so _wrong_.

But this time, of course, the boy was old enough to understand what was happening. Or at least he thought he was.

“Am I going to die?” He asked his music tutor.

“I shouldn’t think so, my boy. The disease only kills when one’s eye is trapped for a long time on someone who does not love you back.” He smiled, not unkindly. “It seems your love is too flighty to fix on one person for so long.”

Julian only frowned. “So am I never going to fall in love, then? Properly I mean.”

“Of course you will. I’m sure when you find someone who loves you in return, you heart will settle.”

The boy nodded at that. It made simple sense to a boy of nine.

“What sort of flower is it?”

“Well, I don’t know a lot about flowers, but I think it’s a buttercup. A _jaskier_.”

Julian hummed, considering something that he did not yet look ready to vocalise. He frowned again.

“Will it affect my singing, do you think?”

His tutor smiled. “Let’s run your scales, and find out, shall we?”

As Julian got older, it became clearer that his tutor was right. He was a poet, and an accomplished musician besides, even without a new face to fall in love with for years at a time.

But, Melitele, he was _bored_. He was bored and lonely and he could not stay locked up here for one more day.

“Father, Mother,” he said, “I’m going to go to Oxenfurt to study.”

The Lady Pankratz turned an alarming shade of red. The Earl de Lettenhove merely rolled his eyes.

“Let him go, dear. Let him choke himself to death on flowers if that is his choice. After all, there is still time for us have another Viscount de Lettenhove, especially with you not worrying about _this_ one all the time.”

The Lady Pankratz fled the room, but she later returned and gave her son permission to go.

His smile turned bright and he kissed her cheek and rushed to pack, for the newest term was only a few weeks away.

And he arrived at Oxenfurt, as Jaskier, spitting jaunty tunes and soulful ballads and yellow petals.


	2. Geralt

Geralt of Rivia sips his ale, keeping half an eye trained on the rest of the patrons of the tavern, as he always does. Someone might decide a monster like him has no right to be in there with normal people, and he would rather be out of Posada before someone tries to stab him.

Today, though, it seems, the other people at the inn aren't even aware they have a Witcher in their midst, their attention instead drawn to the brightly-dressed bard doing his best to entertain them. His voice is huskier than Geralt might have expected for someone his age, but then Geralt has never been good at guessing the age of humans.

At the end of one song, the bard raises his fingers to his lips, blowing a kiss at the barmaid. The kiss blows a cloud of something yellow, petals it looks like, and it is a cheap gimmick if ever Geralt saw one. It apparently doesn't impress the crowd either, from the way they boo him down from his next song.

Geralt isn't expecting the bard to slide into the seat across from him and ask for a review.

Geralt isn't expecting the bard to know who he was and to announce it to the tavern.

Geralt _really_ isn't expecting the bard to join him when a famer offers him coin to kill a local devil.

The bard – Jaskier, his name is, apparently, and that explains the blowing of the yellow petals, though Geralt is more than well aware that that cannot be the boy’s birth name – won’t stop talking. Geralt wishes that he had knocked him out before they’d left Posada.

He won’t stop talking, even after Geralt has punched him in the gut. He won’t stop talking, even when they arrive at the area where the so-called devil is supposed to be. He won’t stop talking, even when Geralt is on the floor, grappling with a Sylvan.

Maybe, if Geralt had looked round when he notices that the bard had stopped talking, rather than simply sighing with relief at the sudden, blessed, silence, he might have noticed the silent figure who knocked him out with a blow to the back of the head.

When he comes to, he is tied back-to-back with the bard who is _already talking_. That’s the first thing he notices. The second thing he notices is the elf that starts attacking him and Jaskier.

The Sylvan arrives, and with the king of the elves, Filavandrel.

Jaskier starts mouthing off again, and it strikes Geralt just how _young_ he must be. He knows almost nothing of the world, just what he must have been taught at whatever school decided this boy was old enough to be given a lute and sent off into the world. Probably Oxenfurt, from what he knows about the place.

But the king is patient enough, it seems, to explain exactly what the humans have done to the elves.

Filavandrel’s voice breaks as he talks about his elders, his _family_ , how everyone he loved died and he had to bury them, and suddenly the bard doubles over, coughing. The ties binding the pair of them mean that Geralt has no choice but to arch his back at the same time.

“ _Damnit_ , Jaskier.” He can’t help but hiss, in shock more than pain.

Filavandrel’s eyes narrow and flash to the bard for possibly the first time. He stalks around the pair of them.

“Jaskier?” There’s a lilt to the elven king’s voice that Geralt can’t quite make out. It would be easier to understand if he could see Filavandrel’s expression, he’s sure, but as good as his eyesight is he still can’t see out of the back of his head.

Then Filavandrel is back in front of him, and it’s as though nothing had happened.

When they are cut loose from their bindings, Filavandrel pulls Jaskier aside. They go further away than a human would have been able to hear them, and perhaps even an elf, but nor far enough away for a Witcher.

“You should take these back, they are yours after all,” says Filavandrel, but Geralt cannot turn around to see what he is talking about without giving himself away, so busies himself checking over Roach, his ear still tuned into the conversation between the bard and the king.

“No, I rather think they’re yours,” comes Jaskier’s reply. There is a heavy pause.

“I am sorry.” Geralt cannot imagine what Filavandrel has to be sorry for, but there is a palpable layer of concern coating his words. “Will you be alright?”

Jaskier’s voice is all smiles, and Geralt hates that he can tell that after knowing the bard for such a short amount of time. “My love is deep, but only ever fleeting, your majesty.”

Another pause.

“Take this.” The king is obvious holding out another thing that Geralt still cannot see.

“What? No, I couldn’t. Are you serious?”

“Write a song with your love, bard. Let people know we’re weak and broken. Then they won’t come looking for us.”

Geralt does not know what gestures pass between them, but soon enough he can hear that Jaskier is on his way over towards him and Roach. Clutched in his hands is a finely-wrought lute.

Geralt glances over at Filavandrel, who is looking at Jaskier strangely. With his enhanced eyesight Geralt can just make out yellow petals cupped in the elven king’s hands.


	3. Jaskier

Jaskier’s whole life has been filled with the rounded yellow petals of buttercups. They are his name, his signature during a performance. They have become so commonplace to him that he scarcely notices anymore.

It isn’t until Jaskier is safely lodged in Oxenfurt for the harsh winter months when he looks down at the petals he has coughed into his hands and sees smaller, thinner petals dotted around the buttercups.

He doesn’t recognise them by sight, but then he has never paid much attention to flowers outside the ones he calls his own. He doesn’t know who has lodged in his heart _differently_ to cause them to bloom.

Or maybe he does. There was something about Geralt of Rivia that made Jaskier want to stick around him, want to know more, and that had only increased since he saw how selfless he had been with the elves. People may say that he’s a monster, the Butcher of Blaviken, but that’s not the man that Jaskier knows.

But it’s been almost a _month_ since he last saw the Witcher, since he went up into the mountains for the winter, and it wouldn’t make sense that the petals are only appearing _now_.

Jaskier decides not to think about it, and dives back into teaching and composing without wondering about the cause of the new petals again.

(He does think about it. He can’t stop thinking about it.)

He runs into Geralt again in the spring, and lodges himself back into the Witcher’s life whether he likes it or not. Jaskier’s songs have started to run ahead of them, and it’s not uncommon for a whole tavern of people to join in the chorus of “Toss a Coin to your Witcher”.

He can’t help but smirk at Geralt when their pockets are laden and they can afford to sleep in a comfortable room for the night. This was largely his doing, after all.

They often save money by sharing a room and a bed, and Jaskier feels almost like there’s something blooming inside him as they spend long evening warm in each-others company.

It feels like something blooming, but the smaller petals have almost completely disappeared since he found the Witcher again.

They reappear the following winter, when Jaskier is alone.

They recede again when he finds Geralt again.

Another winter at Oxenfurt, another appearance of the smaller yellow petals that feel so out of place.

The pattern continues, and Jaskier cannot deny that that is what it is.

He has a feeling that the quantity of the new petals each year is increasing, but he has no real way to measure it.

It’s fine though, it must be.

He’s been coughing up buttercups for years, and nothing truly bad has come of it, just a hoarser singing voice than the tenor that his teachers all expected from him.

He’ll be fine.

He’ll find Geralt again in the spring.

Whatever this love is that’s causing new petals to bloom for Geralt, it’s different from the love he has felt before.

It doesn’t stop him from falling a little in love with everyone he meets, still. No, of course not. He is still enamoured with the little idiosyncrasies of each individual, the things that make them _them_. It certainly hasn’t stopped him from acting on that love in the beds of barmaids and bards and bastards and anyone in between.

But running under all of that, now, are thoughts of the White Wolf of Rivia. Of his gruff exterior and inability to respond to questions other than with vague hmmms, but of the way his heart is larger and more open than he would ever admit to anyone, even himself.

When Jaskier receives an invite from the princess Pavetta herself to play at her wedding banquet, he knows he’s going to bring Geralt along with him.

Not just because of the potential of angry cuckolds that he needs a bodyguard against, though that is definitely a potential problem that he should probably be taking more seriously.

Not just because he wants to see how well Geralt scrubs up in courtly clothes – although that is definitely something Jaskier is thinking about more than he should have been. He’s already had the clothes commissioned. He’s stuck to the Witcher’s customary dark colour scheme, however boring it may be, but the cut of the cloth? Well, Jaskier is very much looking forward to seeing Geralt in them.

No, the main reason that Jaskier will bring Geralt to the wedding with him is that it’s in the summer, and Jaskier wants to spend as much time with Geralt as he can before the next winter finds him alone at Oxenfurt, coughing up more yellow petals than he know what to do with.


	4. Geralt

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys!  
> I just wanted to say that the posting is going to be a bit erratic because I haven't planned a lot of this and I'm in the middle of a bunch of coursework deadlines for uni; I'm basically just planning on writing/updating when I have motivation/time, so that could be tomorrow, it could be another few weeks.  
> Thanks to everyone for reading so far (and for subscribing! This has the most subscribers out of anything I've posted it's such a cool feeling!) I love you guys <3

Geralt should have known, the moment that Jaskier invited him to the wedding feast, that something bad was going to happen.

He should have known the moment that Jaskier produced what vaguely passed as the clothes of a nobleman to him.

He should have known the moment Mousesack noticed him. (Not that the so-called ‘disguise’ Jaskier had produced for him would have ever hidden him.)

He should have known that something wasn’t quite right when Jaskier excused himself mid-way through his set. It was about the same point in time when he’d normally blow his handful of yellow petals across the eager crowd – people seemed to have stopped seeing it as a gimmick, and it was almost expected of him now. But the petals made no appearance this time, and Geralt could only assume that Pavetta, or, more likely, Calanthe, had forbidden him from doing so.

It didn’t explain why Jaskier had left the room for a break part-way through his set, though.

Unfortunately, Geralt forgot about that almost immediately afterwards, when he was ended up in a sword fight defending a cursed man, and then almost got blown away by a burst of magic, and then found his future self in possession of a child surprise.

Fuck.

Jaskier has been breezing in and out of Geralt’s life for – how long now? Years? A decade?

Geralt has never paid attention to the passage of time before. Time is a concern for people who age, not for Witchers. But time feels real now that Geralt is frequently seeing the same person, watching as he changes.

He doesn’t change a great deal, for a human. Not in a way that other humans would notice. But even the smallest changes leap out at Geralt. The faint lines starting to dance around his eyes. The occasional strand of grey, which even Jaskier himself hasn’t noticed.

Geralt knows, he _knows_ he shouldn’t get attached. Not to a human, whose life will flicker and stop while Geralt keeps on going and going. Especially not to a human like Jaskier, who puts _himself_ into harm's way more frequently than not, be it falling into bed with every pretty eyes or nose or smile he sees, regardless of that person’s marital status (though never regardless of their consent), or be it following closely at Geralt’s feet even when he is hunting something that could easily kill the Witcher himself, let alone the fragile bard.

But it’s so hard not to get attached.

Jaskier has been breezing in and out of Geralt’s life for longer than Geralt should really have let him do so, and Geralt still feels like he doesn’t understand the bard at all.

Each spring the bard will find him.

It doesn’t matter how far away from Oxenfurt Geralt goes, he always runs into Jaskier singing at an inn less than a month after he has left Kaer Morhen.

He could leave, he always could, before Jaskier notices he is there. Could leave and ride and spend the year travelling alone.

He never does.

Instead he stays and watches the bard, the way his face lights up as he sings, the way he smiles and winks at the audience, the way he blows those gimmick-y petals half way through a set, and often again at the end, the way his eyes shine brighter the moment he notices Geralt standing there.

Geralt actually quite likes Jaskier’s singing. He’d never admit that to the bard though.

No matter how much he pretends to be annoyed at it, though, Geralt cannot help but be grateful to Jaskier and his songs. They have made it almost easier to be a Witcher. More comfortable, anyway. It’s easier to pay for a room for the night when people toss you coins.

Sometimes they’ll have to share a room, and Geralt will never, ever admit to Jaskier how much he enjoys it.

Geralt still doesn’t understand why Jaskier decided that yellow petals were going to be his _thing_. He isn’t quite sure where he gets them either, because he always has a supply of fresh petals, no matter how long it has been since Geralt has seen any in bloom.

If he didn’t know any better, if he couldn’t _see_ Jaskier aging, he’d think it was magic.

As it is he doesn’t know what to think.

There are always a second type of petal in the first performance Geralt sees Jaskier make every year, but they soon disappear.

Geralt writes it off as just another _Jaskier_ thing, and pushes it to the back of his mind, and the pair set off together, on the lookout for monsters and songs.


	5. Jaskier

This year, Jaskier finds Geralt, rather than the other way round. When Geralt hadn’t appeared at back of an inn after a month, Jaskier had taken it upon himself to find the White Wolf of Rivia. It doesn’t take him long. It’s almost as though the smaller yellow petals that line his throat know when he is getting closer to the Witcher, and start to recede.

They are still thicker than they have been any year before, and started to appear even more when Geralt hadn’t appeared as he normally did, though, and Jaskier knows he really ought to do something when he finds Geralt.

It’s not sure what it should be, but it should be _something_.

Unfortunately, when he does find Geralt, he is throwing a net into a lake with a half-crazed look on his face.

Jaskier is worried. He’s never seen Geralt like this, not in the nine years and seven months it’s been since they first met. (He’s been counting.)

He tries to help, but then Geralt says something about Jaskier’s singing that he doesn’t mean – that he surely, surely doesn’t mean, because it feels like it’s tearing Jaskier apart that Geralt doesn’t appreciate the one thing that’s truly Jaskier’s _own_.

And maybe, _maybe_ , Jaskier gets a little bit mouthy, because that’s just who is as a person, as they attempt to wrestle a Djinn bottle from each-other’s hands.

Jaskier claims the Djinn, throwing his wishes away on things he wants, but doesn’t want as much as he wants _Geralt_. Geralt is one thing that he would never seek to claim though magic.

He is shouting, and then Geralt is shouting, and then Jaskier suddenly can’t shout anymore. His throat is half-closed, and he is scrabbling up at it as if that would make any difference whatsoever.

He’s used to flower petals lining his throat. He’s had those for as long as he can remember. This is something entirely new.

Jaskier floats in and out of consciousness. There might be an elf. There might be a naked man. There might be an orgy. He doesn’t know. He can’t think. He can’t _breathe_.

(There’s a horrible, morbid feeling that, even if he doesn’t die now, this will be the way he goes. Struggling for breath, but instead of his throat being closed, it will be stuffed full of yellow petals).

Eventually he sleeps. He dreams.

He dreams of the many people he has loved. They line up and watch him, and his mouth fills with the petals for all of them and he is _drowning_.

He wakes up to a beautiful, slightly terrifying dark-haired woman sitting on the edge of his bed. He opens his mouth to ask where he is, who she is, did they have sex? but instead all he can do is roll onto his side, coughing up all the yellow petals that had been caught down in his lungs when his throat had closed, his usual smattering of buttercups together with the smaller petals that have lodged themselves in his chest since he met Geralt. But now those smaller petals are starting to clump together, coming out as a whole section of a flower in the way that the buttercups had never done.

The woman remains unmoved, though there might be something flashing behind her eyes when he glances up at her, though it’s gone, replaced with a hard coolness, before he has the chance to work out what it is.

“I got rid of the djinn’s spell, bard, but you’ll have to use your last wish to get rid of those.”

Jaskier blinks up at her. He opens his mouth to respond, but is hit with another rack of coughs. He reaches a hand towards the half-formed flowers that lie on the pillow, surrounded by buttercups. The petals, unrecognisable alone, have come together to form dandelions.

The flower is softer than he had expected, given it had emerged from his lungs.

Eventually, he manages to drag his attention back to the woman, and formulate the response for which she is still staring at him, waiting for.

“Why would I want to do that?” His voice feels dry from disuse, but it doesn’t seem like the larger clumps of petals have done any damage.

Her expression does not change, but her voice is tinged with confusion. “They’ll kill you.”

He shrugs as he pushes himself into a sitting position. “They’ve been around for over twenty years. I imagine they’d have killed me before now. Then again, they’ve never done this before,” he pauses, stroking the half-dandelions again. He shakes himself out of it. It won’t do to dwell too much on this. “Besides, I’m fairly sure I remember that magical cures remove the ability to love. And that wouldn’t be worth it.”

The scary lady is staring at him as if he’s said something utterly incomprehensible, but it’s the truth, and it’s all he has to offer right now.

“Only the love that creates the petals would be gone” is all she says. He opens his mouth to respond, to say that that’s a life without love at all for him. She interrupts him before he can start babbling again. “Whatever, bard, I don’t have time for this. Ask the djinn for your third wish and get out.”

He nods, and pushes himself up. He slides the dandelions into his small pouch, retrieved from the table by the side of the bed, but he leaves the buttercup petals. They are probably the woman’s, after all. As scary as she is, she is beautiful, and fascinating, and Jaskier cannot help but want to know more about her. He gives his heart far too easily, he knows. But what else does he have to give?

“I wish to leave this place.” He says, and he walks out of the door.


	6. Yennefer

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry it's been so long! This chapter stumped me a bit and I had to work my way around several things. I hope that the way this chapter pans out makes sense, please let me know if it doesn't! <3

Yennefer of Vengerburg’s day has not been going as she thought it would.

It had started with an orgy, which was expected, and then a rude interruption had ended up with her having a bath with a Witcher, and then she had healed a bard from a Djinn’s curse and watched him cough up flowers and shrug it off, as if it was nothing, as if it was normal.

Yen has never seen the effects of this particular disease up close before. It’s a rare and painfully _human_ disease, to choke to death on the blossoms of love. It seems to avoid those who can wield magic, for reasons that even the most studious mages have never been able to tell.

It’s a horrifying prospect, to Yennefer. Having your throat fill up with flowers, slowly choking, drowning on sweet petals that created themselves in your lungs. Loving someone, giving your heart to someone, without the promise of that being returned.

That the bard had said that he would rather die from than live without love… its almost incomprehensible to her.

Because Yen’s not sure she quite understands the idea of giving away one’s heart at all. She’s never… she’s never looked at someone and thought: ‘there is someone I could love’. Even with Istredd it was just sex. Sex with a close friend, with someone she cared about. She still felt betrayed at the way he treated her. But it was never anything more. Never the butterflies in stomachs that the other girls at Aretuza described. Never the love that the bard Jaskier would rather die than be without.

Then again, if the bard has been coughing up petals for as long as he says he has, then it must have started young. Perhaps _his_ love is not the same as everyone else’s either…

No matter. Yennefer has more important things to worry about.

There’s a Djinn here, and Yen may not feel the want of romantic love, but she does still _want_. She wants so much, and so hard, and if trapping a magical spirit and forcing it to give her everything is the way to get it, then so be it.

Air is whipping through the room, and she’s doing everything she can to _control_ it. It’s hard, it’s far harder than it should have been. The bard’s wish to go and his subsequent departure should have been enough to release the Djinn. But instead she is straining and straining, and there’s a pressure building.

And then Geralt is back – and why is he here? Shouldn’t he be with his… _friend_? His friend whom she has just saved, who coughs up flower petals like they are normal.

Geralt is shouting, and Yennefer is screaming, and there is _something_ within her, trying to utterly take control, and then Geralt says something in a lower tone, and the world goes silent.

The Djinn is gone.

Yennefer _screams_.

She does not _love_ like others, she does not _want_ that love like others, she wants one thing and one thing only, and that opportunity has been torn away from her, again and again. She lunges at Geralt, meaning to scratch and tear at him.

But the floor creaks and the walls shake and the tower room starts to tumble to the ground, and she is creating a portal and pushing him through it, to a lower floor, to safety. She suddenly finds that she could not bear it, if he died.

That is not a feeling that she recognises.

“What did you wish for, Witcher?” She asks, when they are safely resting in a room that is not about to collapse on top of them. “What have you done to me?”

Yennefer had landed on top of him, straddling him, after the effort that went into forcing him through the portal. Geralt is staring up at her in shock, as if that was not the reaction he was expecting her to have, especially given their somewhat-compromising position.

The Witcher opens his mouth to speak, but before he can get a word out his attention is drawn by a noise at the window. Yen follows his gaze to see the bard, hovering in the window.

His shirt is still stained with blood, and his eyes are trained on Geralt where he is pinned between Yennefer’s thighs. When he notices Yennefer staring at him, his eyes flash with pain. He turns away coughing, and Yennefer can just about make out yellow petals between his fingers.

Yennefer pushes off Geralt. She still doesn’t know what his wish did, but nor does she want to anymore. What she can see from the bard’s reaction to her entanglement with the Witcher is exactly who Jaskier’s flowers are blooming for, and she will have no part in speeding up his inevitable demise.


	7. Geralt

Geralt doesn’t see Jaskier again for almost a year.

He doesn’t strictly _look_ for him. After all, he is mostly bound by where he can find contracts and coin. But if he tends to stray closer to towns which he knows Jaskier likes, where the bard has been well-received in the past, in the hope of seeing him again, well, who’s to know.

But everywhere he asks after Jaskier, no-one has seen him.

One barmaid says: “Oh, the buttercup bard? Poor thing. Imagine he’s choked on those petals by now.”

Geralt thinks that that is a weird thing to assume; it’s not as though he keeps the petals in his _mouth_ during the performance, he wouldn’t be able to sing, then. Then again, now that he thinks about it, it must be difficult to pluck at a lute whilst also cradling a handful of yellow petals in the same hand.

It must be that Jaskier isn’t entirely human, that he has a small amount of magic which he uses to craft his image, as ‘the buttercup bard’ as the maid called him.

It must be that. It’s the only possible explanation for his incessant yellow petals.

But yes, Geralt searches for Jaskier as much as he can whilst also killing Drowners and Kikimora and Griffins and all the other kinds of monsters which hunt and cause havoc among humans.

He concludes, eventually, that Jaskier must be in Oxenfurt. That is where the bard tends to spend the winter, after all, so he must have a home there, and it makes sense that that is where he would retreat after such a close brush with death.

Geralt refuses to go to Oxenfurt to find him. He tells himself it’s because there are less dangerous monsters in the cities than in the villages, and more people to deal with them. Really, it is more because it would feel like he was invading somewhere Jaskier sees as _safe_. Jaskier has always managed to find him, before, so perhaps if he is home, that is where he does not want to be found.

After all, if Jaskier randomly appeared in Kaer Morhen one winter – not that he would be able to, it is too remote, the path too cold and windswept and impossible to follow if you do not know the way – but if he _were_ to appear at Kaer Morhen then Geralt would… Geralt would hate it, wouldn’t he?

(His mind is suddenly full of images of Jaskier wrapped in furs in the great stone hall, sat in front of the fire and strumming his lute, telling stories as Eskel smiles and Lambert laughs and Vesemir gives the small nod he does when he approves of something. Maybe he wouldn’t hate it. Maybe he would _like_ it. Maybe.)

Geralt stops seeking him, and continues the Path as he would do normally, regardless of where Jaskier may be. It doesn’t stop him from keeping an ear out at inns for a husky, tuneful singing voice or stories of a handsome man who blows yellow petals like kisses.

He still doesn’t find him.

He goes back to Kaer Morhen for winter, and it’s quieter than normal. It. It isn’t quieter than normal. Everyone is _there_ , everyone that’s still alive – and, Melitele, it’s so _few_ of them now – but it feels colder and emptier than is has for the past few years.

He can’t work out why.

“If it’s alright, I was thinking of inviting the bard next winter,” he says offhandedly to Vesemir one day in the kitchen. Vesemir looks at him strangely, but nods in assent.

“I might invite Jaskier to stay next winter,” he tells Eskel, when they are sat together in the library. Eskel smiles at him warmly.

“It’s about time,” he replies. Geralt’s not entirely sure what he means.

“I’m planning on asking Jaskier to spend winter here,” he mentions to Lambert after dinner.

“What, want to keep your bed warm?” Lambert says, a grin in his voice. Geralt lunges at him across the table and wrestles him to the floor.

“It’s not _like_ that!” He exclaims. He doesn’t know why the question continues to haunt him.

When the snows melt and the spring comes, he sets back out on the Path.

He goes town to town, checking out notice boards and claiming contracts.

Jaskier finds him again, and it as though the events of the previous years had never happened.

The only difference is a persistent cough, and the fact that the sweetness of his scent has become stronger, more cloying.

He doesn’t ask about it, because a large part of their relationship is based on Jaskier talking about everything and nothing and Geralt not asking questions.

He finds he cannot help it, though, when he sees a full, healthy dandelion head poking out of Jaskier’s bag when the summer starts to turn to autumn, and the weather starts to chill, and he _knows_ they haven’t seen any for over a week.

“I’ve been wondering, Jaskier,” he starts, and Jaskier turns to face him, his eyes wide with a sort of excitement, “where _do_ you get your flowers from?”

Jaskier’s face shuts down almost immediately. He doesn’t reply, and for almost the first time that Geralt has known him, he doesn’t say anything at all for the next few days.

When he does speak, it is to tell Geralt that he is heading back to Oxenfurt for the winter.

Geralt returns to Kaer Morhen alone.

He isn’t sure why that hurts quite as much as it does.


	8. Jaskier

Jaskier is pretending that nothing has changed, that everything is fine. He’s not sure he’s fooling anyone.

Looking through the window, seeing the woman – a mage, Yennefer of Vengerberg, he finds out from an elf who is apparently in love with _her_ , who wears no petals but an expression of sadness – perched on Geralt’s lap, hurts Jaskier more than anything the Djinn could ever have done. The way she was leaning over him, chest bare, their eyes locked on each-other, is a confirmation of Geralt’s feelings. Where before, Jaskier could tell himself that it was just that Geralt was bad at expressing his emotions, and the small kind things he did for Jaskier was enough love to made the dandelion petals abate while he was with the Witcher, now he can see the truth.

Geralt’s taste lies more in the way of beautiful, terrifying mages. What could he possibly want with _Jaskier_.

Jaskier’s disease, his affliction, his _curse_ gets steadily worse with this knowledge. He goes straight back to Oxenfurt after leaving Rinde. He can settle in to teach for a while. Geralt will know where to find him, when he comes to find Jaskier after finishing having fun with the mage. If he wants to find Jaskier, that is.

Geralt never arrives.

Jaskier’s mind can’t help but fixate on this fact. Geralt doesn’t come, because he never wanted Jaskier around him in the first place. Geralt doesn’t come, because he is busy with Yennefer, he is _happy_ with Yennefer, he _loves_ Yennefer.

The knowledge feels like a weight on Jaskier’s lungs. Or maybe that is just the flowers.

The dandelions are coming faster and fuller, now. When he plays for an audience, be it for a class he is teaching or at one of the local inns, he has to keep his sets shorter, or at least schedule in breaks where he can leaving the room to pull flower-heads from the back of his mouth. There are no more blown kisses of yellow buttercup petals for his audience. The buttercups are still there, his heartbreaking, _unrequited_ love for Geralt does not mean that he suddenly can resist the love he feels at a striking cheekbone or a charming laugh. But the first time after the Djinn incident he attempted to blow his kiss of petals during a performance, he doubles over choking for several minutes. He does not attempt it again.

The way he feels for Geralt is different, it is all-consuming. It is killing him, like the disease is _supposed_ to.

He often catches his students throwing him sympathetic looks. His colleagues pull him aside and enquire after his health. His oldest friends offer him a shoulder to lean on and words of what they believe is good advice.

He knows that he cannot stay in Oxenfurt much longer.

He leaves the following spring, and finds Geralt without even looking for him, the way he always has done. It is like the previous year was a dream, at least for a while. The dandelions even slow their growth, a little.

But then they run into Yennefer in a town, and in another. She never touches Geralt again, she barely even flirts with him, but her very presence is a reminder of the loss of all the hope that Jaskier ever had for Geralt loving him back.

After that, the flowers grow worse again. By the end of summer, his is pulling almost full dandelions out of his mouth, complete with stems. Only leaves left to go, and then the roots will start to take hold, if the stories Jaskier has heard are correct.

He doesn’t know how much time this gives him. He doesn’t know how much longer he will be able to _sing_. It is getting harder as it is, his throat raw and his mouth full.

The seasons turn, the vibrant greens of summer turning into oranges and browns, and Jaskier’s mouth is still full of yellow.

And then Geralt asks where Jaskier is getting his flowers from.

The question is another huge blow to Jaskier’s heart. It’s the worst question he could have asked. The harshest, the most insensitive question. Is he _mocking_ Jaskier, and his impending death? By Melitele, Geralt, there are no dandelions to be found growing anywhere around. Where _else_ could they come from?

The pain of the question is almost as bad as seeing Geralt pinned between Yennefer’s thighs. The fact that Geralt can’t even _comprehend_ that Jaskier might be in love with him is as good as a death sentence.

Jaskier goes back to Oxenfurt earlier than he had intended to.

But the heart wants what it wants, and come the spring, Jaskier cannot help but find himself at Geralt’s side. If this is the way he is going to go, he at least wants to do it at the side of the man he loves differently, of the man he loves _most_.

Even if that man feels nothing for him in return.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was genuinely intending on getting to the dragon hunt by this chapter, but alas, it was time for more Jaskier angst.


	9. Geralt

Something has _changed_ between Jaskier and Geralt, and Geralt cannot for the life of him work out exactly what has caused it. Jaskier is sadder, more closed off. He rarely reaches out and clasps Geralt’s shoulder the way he used to. Sometimes, when Geralt glances sideways, he catches Jaskier with tears in his eyes, though they always disappear when Jaskier notices him looking.

Then there is Jaskier’s coughing. What had started with him coughing only infrequently have turned into fits where the bard can barely breathe. They happen whenever he has run too fast, or sung too long, but sometimes when they stop off at little villages, without any sense of rhyme or reason that Geralt can see. It’s getting worse. It’s getting worse and that is somehow terrifying.

The worst of it is that, when they happen, Jaskier won’t let Geralt _near_ him. If they are in an inn he’ll let a barmaid rub his back, a _stranger_ , but he flinches if he realises Geralt is anywhere near him. Geralt’s fingers _itch_ to offer a gentling hand, to hold him steady. He just wants Jaskier to be ok.

There’s nothing he can _do_. Geralt isn’t human, he has no knowledge of human diseases. He’s never _had_ to have knowledge of human diseases before. Is it simply a chill that Jaskier hasn’t been able to shake? Is it a sign of his age? – Geralt has no idea how old Jaskier _is_. Is it a symptom of _something_ _else_?

He can’t even ask Jaskier what he can do to help. He’s _tried_ , he’s tried several times, but each time Jaskier’s shoulders tense and his smell turns sour and he won’t talk or even sing.

If Geralt cannot help Jaskier, he would at least rather he were happy.

Geralt _will_ invite Jaskier to winter at Kaer Morhen this year. He _will_.

Geralt finds himself invited to hunt a dragon. He’s about to say no. Of course it is. Dragons are dangerous and endangered; they are only hunted by the greedy and the foolish. And the air is thinner, the higher up they go. Will that be bad for Jaskier? (He doesn’t know. He doesn’t know how human biology is affected by such things. Human biology doesn’t _matter_ to a Witcher. Or, well, it has never mattered _before_.)

But then Yennefer walks in, an over-eager knight like a puppy at her heels.

And because somehow Geralt of Rivia, the Butcher of Blaviken, has found _two_ non-Witchers who he cares for, who he wants to protect, and because he doesn’t know if thin air is dangerous but he knows for certain that dragons are, he says that he’ll do it.

He tries not to hear Jaskier spluttering beside him.

Geralt’s relationship with Yennefer is… it’s not really a relationship, in any sense of the word. They’re barely even friends. Geralt _does_ care about her. He cared about her enough to bind her to him with a Djinn wish, and, well, if that’s the reason he still feels drawn towards her, then at least there was that connection drawing her to him to start with.

Yennefer, on the other hand, seemed enthusiastic, at first, but she had clearly noticed whatever effect the magic of the Djinn had had. After that, each time Geralt had stumbled across her in a random little village – which was more often than it would have been, if dictated by chance – she gave off a distinct air of not caring at all about Geralt.

She is doing the same thing now, each time Geralt tries to talk to her on this hike up the mountain.

He knows her well enough – at least, he is fairly certain that he does – to know that it is all some type of pretence. He knows that she cares, somehow, at least a little. If she _truly_ didn’t care, she wouldn’t bother responding to him. She is not the sort to waste time on people she doesn’t want to.

It is the frosty air that springs up between Yennefer and Jaskier that concerns him most. Jaskier is cruel and snappy in a way that Geralt has never seen him be with anyone else (though not dissimilar to the rants about a certain Valdo Marx that the bard has frequently subjected Geralt to).

It all comes to a head, for Geralt at least, when Jaskier all but calls Yennefer a whore with a cold, twisting anger, and Yennefer stands up to leave. Geralt cannot blame her. This is not the Jaskier he knows and lov- cares for. This is not the man he used to be.

Geralt follows after Yennefer, to apologise, to ask if she understands why Jaskier is being like this. He shoots Jaskier a reprimanding look as he leaves.

He pretends not to hear Jaskier choking.

When he asks Yennefer, she fixes him with a look of utter disdain, and vanishes into her tent.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There are potentially 3 or 4 more chapters left to go but I won't make any promises, because who knows how things will turn out!


	10. Jaskier

Jaskier cannot even remember a time when there were not flowers growing in his lungs. But he does remember the time he found out it was supposed to be fatal, and was assured that for _him_ it was different.

He had felt special. Immortal.

He has never felt as mortal as he does now.

His chest _aches_ as he stumbles up the mountain path, barely able to get any air into his lungs at all. He shouldn’t have come, he shouldn’t have come.

But how could he have stayed away from Geralt, when he isn’t sure how much time he has left at all?

It is not just yellow petals, now. There are still yellow buttercup petals, sometimes, though the pain of lungs full of flowers is often too much of a distraction. Most of the time, now, it is dandelions: yellow flowers and green leaves and brown roots, all tinged red with blood.

He has been composing a song. A crooning ballad, that takes less air to sing than he more famous drinking songs. It is not a song extolling Geralt’s virtues, not this time. This time it is all about Jaskier, and Geralt, and Yennefer, and how Yennefer has destroyed _everything_ , Jaskier’s lungs and livelihood and life, by proving, firmly, that his love for Geralt will never be reciprocated.

What would Geralt want with a human bard when he could have an immortal mage by his side?

The look on Geralt’s face when he goes after Yennefer is…

He chooses Yennefer, just how he always chooses Yennefer.

Jaskier shouldn’t have come.

He probably shouldn’t be on a rope bridge, hanging high up the side of a mountain when he can hardly get enough air in his lungs to keep his legs beneath him on solid ground.

Borch and Tea and Vea fall. Jaskier is surprised that it wasn’t him.

Maybe it should have been him.

Would falling into a cold ravine to die be more pleasant than slowly choking on unrequited love?

“We could head to the coast. Get away for a while.” He suggests to Geralt, later.

There would be worse places to die. Jaskier has always loved the ocean.

He hopes Geralt will come with him. He doesn’t want to die alone. Geralt may not return his love, but he has been Jaskier’s closest friend for so long now.

“I’m just, uh… just trying to work out what pleases me.” He says when Geralt asks him what he’s talking about.

It’s a lie. He knows what makes him happy. Or, well, he knows what _would_ make him happy.

But Geralt leaves and goes to Yennefer. He always goes to Yennefer.

Jaskier sleeps deeply that night, once he finally drifts off. It is always hard to get to sleep now, his brain turning over and over, what could he have done differently? As though that makes any difference now.

But once his brain has quietened, it is as though his body is preparing him for when he will never wake up again.

When he finally drags himself up, his lungs are screaming for air. It takes several deep breaths, and several full plants pulled out of his mouth, tugging against his throat and making him gag, before he has enough mental energy to look around him.

He is alone at the camp.

He pulls himself up and all but drags himself down the path in the direction they were heading in. Breathing is even harder today, at the top of the mountain where the air is thinner.

Or maybe it is harder because he watched Geralt walk away from him again and again, not even bothering to reply to his comment about the coast.

By the time he reaches the dragon’s cave, the battle is already over.

Geralt is angry at – something. Borch for lying to them? The dwarves for attempting to cheat their way to being there first? Yennefer in some sort of lover’s spat?

Jaskier isn’t sure, because he can barely concentrate on anything but the fact that he cannot _breathe_.

He hopes its Yennefer. Call him spiteful, but…

But, if it’s Yennefer then maybe, just maybe, there’s a chance that…

No. None of that. There’s no chance of that. But a fight with Yennefer might mean that Geralt will stay with Jaskier until the end.

It looks like the cause of Geralt’s anger might be Yennefer, as she storms back towards the campsite, her face a storm.

“Phew! What a day!” He says, as though he had taken part in any of it, as he approaches Geralt.

His foot catches on a rock, unable to focus on talking and walking and breathing at the same time. It’s alright. Geralt is there to catch him. Geralt, does catch him, setting him back steadily on his feet.

But then Jaskier looks up at his face.

Geralt is angrier than Jaskier had realised, his face contorted into a frown the likes of which Jaskier has never seen him wear before.

“Damn it, Jaskier! Can’t you look after yourself for five damn minutes!”

“Well, that’s not fair-” Jaskier wheezes out, the almost-fall having knocked what little breathe had been left from his lungs.

“There! You can barely breathe, Jaskier, yet _here you are_ , acting as if you can be the hero. I should have left you at the bottom of the mountain. I should have left you in _Posada_!”

There it is. It’s like a final truth, slapping Jaskier round the face. Cutting into his chest like a knife. He feels like his whole world is ending. But then, it almost certainly _is_.

For once, Geralt is still talking. “If life could give me one blessing, it would be to take _you_ off my hands.”

If Jaskier had air to breathe or the capacity to think of anything other than heartbreak, he might have sniped back ‘life will grant you that blessing sooner than you think’.

As it is, he murmurs something about going, stumbling over the words even as he stumbles over his own feet in an attempt to _leave_.

If he can just get back to the campsite, he might be able to find somewhere to hide, to curl up and let the yellow petal take up the rest of his lungs away from the pitying glances of others. Away from the scornful glares of a man who has apparently always _hated_ him. A man whom Jaskier loves more than his own life.

He won’t be able to see the coast again, after all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oof big angst I'm sorry
> 
> PLEASE let me know if there's something you think I should tag this chapter is pretty heavy but I'm struggling to work out exactly how to tag it
> 
> Thanks to everyone reading this I love you guys <3


	11. Yennefer

Yennefer is livid. She wants to scream until the sky shakes. She wants to throw Geralt down the mountain. Instead she storms off, planning on packing up and portalling away and, most importantly, never seeing that godsdamned Witcher ever again.

Geralt had acted so glibly about the wish he made to the Djinn, about how he had bound Yennefer to him in a way that he didn’t understand, about how he changed part of Yennefer intrinsically. It was as if he didn’t care. As if she didn’t matter.

She had never felt like this about anyone before, had never woken up dreaming about nothing more than being held tight and cared for. Had never even _wanted_ a romance.

She had thought that maybe, maybe, this meant that she wasn’t different. She wasn’t broken. Which was a ridiculous thing to think, given that she hadn’t thought she was broken _before_. But there it was, an idea tickling at the back of the brain about how this way she felt about Geralt meant that she was normal.

And, in the end, it was nothing more than some primeval, elemental magic binding them together. And that’s all Geralt treated it as. As if it never even _mattered_.

The _bastard_.

She means to leave immediately, to pack up her tent and go. Instead she goes into the tent and throws everything breakable at the floor. Fixes them again. Throws them.

It makes her feel a little better. It makes her feel more in control.

She hates feeling out of control.

She has disappeared her belongings, her tent. It’s as if she was never even here. She wishes she never had been. She’s ready to leave this mountain and never come back.

But then she hears it.

Coughing. Wheezing. Spluttering.

Jaskier.

Yennefer has been mostly ignoring Jaskier on this trip up the mountain. After all, she already did her bit to help him; why should she bother having anything else to do with him? Besides, any time she had glanced at him, or he had spoken about her, his face had been a picture of hatred. As if she had ever done anything he could possibly hate her for. She had barely even acted on her new-found feelings for Geralt, even when she thought they were real. It’s not as if _she_ was at fault for the fact that Jaskier was dying.

Because dying he was. Even though she was paying as little attention to Jaskier as possible, it hadn’t been hard to miss the fact that his lungs were almost full to bursting, that he was struggling with every step, with every breath.

But he had not been this close to death the last time she saw him.

He is staggering forward, as though his legs can’t carry his weight.

When he gets closer, it become clear that he simply doesn’t have enough energy to keep going. He is gaunt and pale, and green strands are poking out between his lips as if trying to find space. A trail of bloodied yellow petals are lining the ground behind him.

He looks up, and blanches when he sees her, flinching away slightly as though he was hoping not to see anyone. Hoping that no-one would see him.

His expression is no longer one of hatred or resentment or anger. Merely resignation. An utter absence of hope.

She wonders what Geralt could possibly have done to speed Jaskier’s death up so dramatically. Then again, he has demonstrated himself to be utterly incompetent at feelings.

She could portal away now. Wave her hands and leave him to his fate. She doesn’t like him. He doesn’t like her. They both know that he has been dying for a long time, and that he didn’t want to do anything about it.

She could leave. There’s nothing keeping her here. Except for the fact that Jaskier is dying, and she will not let him die alone.

Jaskier’s legs buckle beneath him, and Yennefer finds herself running towards him.

She kneels down in the dust and the dirt, and cradles his head, turning him onto his side so he doesn’t choke. She’s not sure why. It has always been her against the world. Why is she now giving time to a mortal?

There will be time to examine her thoughts and reasons and reactions later. Right now, she has someone to protect.

“I can remove it.” She is sure she can. She has never tried it before, but it’s all just a little chaos, in the end.

But Jaskier is shaking his head, vehemently, dislodging yellow petals as he moves. She shushes him, even though he doesn’t make a sound other than wheezing breaths and hacking coughs.

Even with the something she felt for Geralt, she can’t imagine loving someone so much that she would rather die than stop loving them. She can’t imagine _wanting_ to.

She has never felt quite so helpless.

(That’s not true. She has, once. Another dying mortal cradled in her arms. Another who lacked the love necessary for their survival.)

(Yennefer has also gone without parental love, and romantic love. But perhaps she is forged of stronger stuff.)

She briefly considers portalling Jaskier down the mountain, to somewhere where the air is less thin and the ground is less rocky. But, honestly, she’s not sure he would make it.

Jaskier is shaking, slightly. Yennefer has no idea how long has passed.

She runs a hand through his hair.

She doesn’t hear Geralt approach. She first notices the glint of sunlight reflecting off his white hair. Anger fires through her, for Jaskier’s sake this time, rather than her own. She doesn’t know why he has come here. Perhaps he thought that they would both be _gone_.

“Yennefer? What’s-” he cuts off abruptly when he sees Jaskier’s curled, crumpled form sheltered in her arms.

Yennefer has never seen the Witcher’s expression so confused, so heartbroken.

And she has never heard, from anyone, in all her years of life, a single word so full of emotion as his next: “ _Jaskier_ ”.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Me after the last chapter: oh! so many lovely comments! I should write the next chapter quickly as a thank you  
> Me, four weeks later: ... ah
> 
> But here it is! Thank you for waiting patiently <3
> 
> We're very close to an end now guys!


	12. Geralt

Geralt regrets his words the moment he is alone with them.

He’s so full of feelings that he can’t even begin to understand. Witcher’s don’t feel emotions: that is what people always said, always taunted when he was out on the path. And so, over the years, Geralt decided that they were right. He stopped _feeling_ anything at all.

And then he met Jaskier. 

And now he’s been left with a tangled ball of pain in his chest that he doesn’t know how to unravel.

He doesn’t understand why Yennefer is so upset, and he doesn’t understand why the fact she is stings like venom.

He doesn’t understand why watching Jaskier’s health gets worse reminds him of being attacked by a flock of harpies – each time he looks it is another fresh wound.

He doesn’t understand why watching Jaskier’s face fall, watching him turn and go, feels like a sword has been stabbed straight through his stomach.

Borch left before Jaskier did, and Geralt is alone on the mountain-side, staring into the grey sky and trying to work out what to _do_.

Catch up and apologise? Wait until both Yennefer and Jaskier are definitely gone?

Will Jaskier even be able to make it down the mountain, sick as he is?

In the end, he decides to give Jaskier a bit of a head start, and then follow. Jaskier probably doesn’t want to see him right now. After all, Geralt had said that he didn’t want to see Jaskier, as far from the truth as that is.

But Geralt can’t risk Jaskier falling down a cliff, or being attacked by a monster they missed on the way up. Geralt will stay far enough away from Jaskier that he won’t be spotted, but that he can get to the bard quickly enough to save him.

Geralt may have hurt Jaskier, perhaps irreparably, but he will not let him die. _Cannot_ let him die. Just the idea burns in his heart, up his throat.

It is not a long path from the cave back to their campsite. Jaskier should be past there are partway down the mountain by now. Geralt needs to go after him, quickly, to find him before he gets into any more trouble.

The path is strewn with yellow petals, the ones that Geralt so frequently sees Jaskier with. But it is also strewn with green stems and red, red blood. Jaskier’s blood. Geralt can smell it.

How has something already found him?

Is Jaskier alright?

He starts to run.

He never thought he would ever see Yennefer sat on the ground. She has always given off the air, to him, that she is above such things. But her dress is caked in a thin layer of grime as she hunches over… something. From this angle, Geralt can’t tell what it is.

Her eyes whip up to meet him, and her face is a picture of anger and anguish.

“Yennefer? What’s-” And then he sees him, folded in on himself, barely a pale imitation of the outgoing bard who had introduced himself all those years ago in Posada. “ _Jaskier”._

Geralt is on his knees in front of them before he is fully aware of moving. His hands hover. He isn’t sure that he is welcome here, but he knows he can’t leave.

Jaskier is hit by a series of racking coughs, curling up impossibly smaller. When he unfurls, yellow petals and green leaves peep out from between his lips. Yennefer, steady handed, helps to pull them away, almost a full flower emerging from the confines of Jaskier’s throat. It drips red.

Geralt has never seen anything like it before.

“What’s _wrong_ with him?” he asks Yen, but he cannot draw his eyes away from Jaskier, barely conscious, barely _breathing_. Not until Yennefer almost _growls_ at him.

“This isn’t _funny_ , Witcher.”

“I’m aware it’s not _funny_ , Witch. Did you curse him?”

“Did I- Did _I curse_ him? This is _your_ fault.” And that’s… _What_?

“ _My_ fault? I can’t do _magic_ Yennefer, I didn’t even know there were spells that could do this.” He snaps his mouth shut when he realises that he is shouting. He can’t lose control. He needs, he needs to work out how to help Jaskier, who is slowly slipping away, his breaths even shallower now.

He can’t let Jaskier die. He _can’t_.

He doesn’t know what he would do with him.

Yennefer is staring at Geralt, her face a picture of confusion where she has always been so confident in everything before. “This isn’t _magic_ , Geralt. It’s a human disease.”

“If it’s just a human disease, you can cure it, right?” The spark of hope the idea lights inside him is killed off as Yennefer grimaces.

“He won’t let me.”

“He won’t _let_ you? Yennefer, Yen, he’s _dying_. Yen, _please_. He _can’t_ die. I can’t live without him. I need to take back what I said, I didn’t _mean_ it, I can’t _lose_ him.”

Jaskier shivers. Geralt _breaks_. He scoops Jaskier into his arms, holding him close, trying to warm him up with the ‘ridiculous body heat’ the bard always used to joke about.

There will be no more of those jokes, if Jaskier dies.

No more inane conversation on lonely roads. No more songs that bend the facts in an annoying manner. No more friendship, no more companionship. No more _love_.

Fuck.

He _loves_ Jaskier, in a way he didn’t think he was capable of doing. It’s different than what he feels for Yen, although he does still care for her. But with Jaskier, it feels more real. It feels so much _more._

He wants to wake up in the mornings with Jaskier beside him. He wants to ride through woods with Jaskier strumming his lute and singing. He wants to take Jaskier home and introduce him to his family.

He’s wanted it for years, but he didn’t, he hadn’t… there was no _word_ for it until now.

Until too late.

Witchers don’t cry. Witchers don’t cry. But there are tears running down his face as he swipes Jaskier’s hair away from his clammy forehead and presses a kiss there. Then he pulls Jaskier into an embrace. One that will never be returned. Not unless Yennefer can _do_ something.

“ _Please_ , Yen.” His voice cracks. “ _Please_. I need you to heal him, to save him. I… I love him. I know you’re angry at me, for the djinn, and I’ve been cruel. But if you do this for me, I’ll do, I’ll do _anything_.” He’s rambling now, but he _needs_ this. “Yen. _Please_. I’m sorry, I’m _sorry_. I thought I loved you, and I messed everything up for the _both_ of us, and I’ll find a way to reverse it, I swear. Just _please_ , _please_ heal him.”

Yennefer opens her mouth to reply, her expression inscrutable.

Jaskier twitches.

“Jaskier?” Geralt’s voice feels raw. He cannot hope.

Jaskier coughs.

The sound is clearer than before.

There is no fresh blood. There are no fresh leaves. There are no fresh flowers.

Just a smattering of small, round, yellow petals.

When Geralt draws his eyes away from the miracle at Jaskier’s mouth, the bards bright blue eyes are open and sparkling.

“Geralt. I’m going to _kill_ you.” Jaskier’s voice is rough, and there is no malice in it. “You were right on the edge there, love, any longer and I…” He swallows.

Geralt cannot help the crease in his brow. “I don’t understand.”

“Shhh. There will be time for understanding, later.” Jaskier smiles, like he has a thousand times before, like sunlight peeking out between the forest leaves, like the first flower of spring. “Now come here and kiss me.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I might come back and add a short epilogue, but to all intents and purposes this is finished!!!  
> Thank you so much to everyone who has read/kudosed/commented, it means so much to me that you enjoy it, and you're all so much of my motivation for writing <3 <3

**Author's Note:**

> Please let me know what you think! Drop me a comment or find me on tumblr at [thebansacredbanned](https://thebansacredbanned.tumblr.com/)


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